


devils torn asunder

by dev0n



Category: Daredevil (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe, X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies), X-Men (Movieverse), X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: Author applies headcanons liberally, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-05
Updated: 2018-01-09
Packaged: 2019-02-28 12:02:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13271058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dev0n/pseuds/dev0n
Summary: "... nightcrawler?" matt had never met any of the x-men, but he knew a bit about some of them.the mutant snorted, unimpressed. "do i look blue to you?"





	1. a well in which you're falling

**Author's Note:**

> more self-indulgent bullshit, yay! i love azazel, i love matt, they're both devil-themed...... it's not TOTAL crack, okay, let me live. i'm not sure if i'll ever actually finish this, but i guess we'll find out.
> 
> azazel's characterization is a combination of comic canon, movie canon, and headcanon. there's not a ton to go off of in the comics and even less in first class, so i think the amount of headcanon i'm applying here is fair. matt's characterization is influenced a bit by comic canon, as well. the timeline is ambiguous and not particularly important. i don't speak russian; anything in russian is from google translate. translations will be put into the end notes. unbeta'd, proofread by me.
> 
> fic title from the song square hammer by ghost. all chapter titles from various songs also by ghost.

The Russians hadn't always been in Hell's Kitchen. They were just one branch of a worldwide operation, the roots of which were in ─ you guessed it ─ Russia. So it wasn't a surprise when a new group of Russians tried to slide into the big void left by the crime families being taken down so swiftly by Daredevil and (much to Matt's chagrin) the Punisher. They were either stupidly ignorant or stupidly brave, because they should have known one vigilante or another would come after them eventually ─ especially when it came to Matt's attention that this new group of Russians was dealing in the same trade as the old ones had been. Human trafficking.

Matt realized pretty quickly that this particular group had been taking _mutant_ captives. Perhaps it was a job better left to the X-Men or the Avengers, but Matt was pretty sure he could handle it. _Pretty_ sure. Besides, he had to take care of it quickly, before the Punisher got there first.

Matt suspected there were several places where captives were being held, but he found one fairly easily. He decided to do a little bit of recon before attacking; the last time he'd rushed into a place without first watching it for a little while, he'd gotten shot. Twice. Hopefully, delaying things would do more good than harm.

Two hours in, however, Matt heard a loud _BAMF!_ from somewhere behind him. The smell of sulfur accompanied it, along with a strong and steady heartbeat. Matt drew his clubs and shifted into a defensive crouch, tilting his head so he appeared to be looking at the new arrival. The man had, Matt realized quickly, an extra appendage. A prehensile tail, to be exact. That combined with the teleportation made him guess aloud ─

"... Nightcrawler?" Matt had never met any of the X-Men, but he knew a bit about some of them.

The mutant snorted, unimpressed. "Do I look blue to you?" he asked in a distinctly slavic accent.

Crap. "It's dark," Matt replied simply, because he could at least tell _that_ much. "And my lenses tint everything red." Maybe that was a little too defensive. Oh, well.

"Then perhaps you should have been guessing red," the mutant replied, "and perhaps you would have been right." He didn't have a combative stance, but that didn't fool Matt into leaving his own.

 _Huh._ Matt filed that away for later consideration; he had more pressing concerns. "Are you one of them?" he asked next, jerking his head toward the warehouse. It would be reprehensible for another mutant to be working against his own kind like this, but then again, it was reprehensible for _non_ -mutants to work against _their_ own kind, too.

"I get enough of this during the Cold War!" the mutant complained, crossing his arms. Matt got the distinct impression that he was _pouting_. "I am Russian, so I am one of the bad guys. Always, I get this."

Matt grimaced. "Why are you here? I'm taking care of this. Hell's Kitchen is under my protection."

"And these are my people," the mutant replied sharply. "I will not let a _human_ be the only hope they have to escape." The way he said it, _human_ , was dripping with disgust. It made Matt scowl.

"How do you know I'm not a mutant?" Matt asked.

"I know," the man replied, waving a hand dismissively. "Maybe I will let you help me, anyway. You are called Daredevil, да? I am Azazel." He didn't try to shake hands, which Matt appreciated; he definitely wouldn't have accepted the offer, and that would make this even more awkward. Matt did, however, shift out of his defensive stance into something a little more casual.

 _Azazel._ And he had (presumably) red skin, and a pronged tail ─ Matt decided not to let his thoughts continue down that road. _There are more important things to worry about,_ he reminded himself, not for the first time that night. "I don't really work with other people."

"You will work with me or not work at all," Azazel replied. Matt made an irritable noise in the back of his throat. He wasn't certain, but he thought he sensed Azazel smiling in response. "Да или нет, Daredevil? We must hurry. Their shipment leaves in two hours."

Azazel was right. Matt cursed. "God damn it. Do you have a plan?"

"Blasphemy," Azazel chastised sarcastically. Matt had to tamp down on the urge to cross himself, anyway. _Sorry, Father._ "I have a plan. You will follow?"

"If I like it," Matt replied, "And if it doesn't involve murder." He stepped closer to the roof's edge and sat.

"You are no fun," Azazel sighed. He followed Matt, crouching down beside him.

Feeling and hearing Azazel's tail swishing back and forth behind them made Matt uneasy. He didn't like this at all, but if Azazel insisted on sticking around, Matt would rather they work together than get in each other's way and fuck everything up. Matt took a deep breath and turned his face toward Azazel. "Alright. Let's hear it."

\---

Working with Azazel was surprisingly easy. His teleportation and his tail both made him a formidable opponent, and Matt found himself grudgingly impressed. Furthermore, Matt only had to stop him from killing people twice before Azazel gave up, snapping something at Matt in Russian that, though he didn't understand it, got the message across well enough. They made it to the holding cells in record time. All of the mutants had physical mutations, Matt realized as he and Azazel set about freeing them from the tightly packed enclosures. He suggested calling the police, but several of the mutants balked at the idea. He asked Azazel what he suggested, and Azazel got a bit of a sour look on his face.

"I am thinking maybe the X-Men will be best to call," Azazel said grudgingly. "I do not like them, but they will at least be keeping all of them safe while we are figuring out what is happening here."

Matt nodded slightly, deciding not to comment on the _'we'_. He had no intention of letting Azazel continue to interfere, regardless of how helpful he'd been tonight. "But how do we contact─"

_BAMF!_

Matt rubbed a hand over his face, considering the startled mutants. "He'll be right back," he assured them, though he had no idea whether that was true. He was right, though; five minutes later, just as the mutants seemed to be getting antsy, there was another loud _BAMF!_ as Azazel returned.

"They are coming. They will be quick; we must go." Azazel looked again to the freed prisoners. "We must protect our own," he said, voice burning with a passion Matt found startling. He crossed his closed fist over his heart. "Remember this always. Мутант и гордый. _Mutant and proud._ "

Surprisingly, some of the mutants imitated the gesture, repeating the words; _"Mutant and proud."_

Azazel lowered his hand to his side, nodding once. And then...

_BAMF!_

... He was gone.

Matt hightailed it out of there before the X-Men arrived.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> да ─ yes  
> Да или нет? ─ yes or no?  
> Мутант и гордый ─ mutant and proud


	2. carried through the times

_"DAREDEVIL TEAMS UP WITH THE DEVIL?"_ Foggy read aloud, and Matt groaned under his breath. "Something you wanna share with the class, Matt?"

"He... He was a mutant. Teleporter. As far as I could tell, he looked a lot like Nightcrawler," Matt said in an undertone. "Regular fingers, though, and he implied he had red skin. Russian accent, said his name was Azazel. I've never heard of him before, but he said he was there for the same reason as I was, and I didn't have time to argue before their shipment left ─ human trafficking, Foggy. All mutants." He sighed and brushed his hair back from his forehead. "It really isn't much of a stretch to insinuate he was the actual Devil, honestly. But either way, I don't plan on working with him again."

"The papers are really having a field day with it, though." Foggy sounded amused. Matt sighed again. "Hey, man, people already thought you were in league with the Devil; now they'll be scared even _more_ shitless," Foggy offered.

"If you say so," Matt replied dubiously. "He wants to take down the whole operation. He was helpful, I'll admit that, but I don't know anything about him. I don't have a great feeling about him."

"That's probably just your Catholic side," Foggy reasoned. "But I mean, isn't Nightcrawler a Catholic? Don't be racist. Wait, is being anti-mutant considered racism? I feel like it would be if they have a physical mutation, at least..."

"Foggy," Matt laughed, exasperated. "Do you think Karen might be able to dig up anything?"

"Karen could dig up anything on anyone," Foggy replied. "I'll give her a call. In the meantime, go look over the Warner case files, will you? I think we have an airtight case, but two metaphorical sets of eyes are better than one."

Matt snorted, getting up from Foggy's desk. "Yeah, yeah. When Alaric gets in, tell them to make Braille copies of the Palmer case, will you? The DA's office 'lost' them. Again." They both knew it was intentional, but until they had sufficient evidence, there was no way they could win a discrimination case against the DA.

"You got it, buddy," Foggy said, and Matt retreated to his office, losing himself in the stack of case files on his desk and client meetings for several hours.

Foggy knocked on Matt's office door a little after noon. "Hey, you wanna go grab lunch? Karen has some stuff for us. Wanted to meet up."

"Oh ─ yeah." Right. Azazel. Matt had almost forgotten. "One second. Let me just..." He typed a few final notes into his computer and saved the file, then closed it and got to his feet. Matt unfolded his cane, walking around his desk to meet Foggy in the waiting room. "We won't be longer than about an hour, 'Lari. If any client has an emergency, just direct it to my work cell, will you?"

"Sure thing, boss," their latest secretary replied without looking up from their computer, fingers flying across the keyboard at a truly impressive speed. "Hey, if you're going to that one cafe, could you maybe─"

"We'll bring you back a latte," Matt agreed before they could finish, amused. "See you in an hour."

"You're an angel, Matt Murdock," Alaric sighed, and Matt laughed as he closed the door behind him. Foggy was already waiting at the stairs.

"No more dating our receptionists, Matt," Foggy warned.

Matt had to laugh again. "What? Alaric flirts with everyone. They flirt with you."

"Yes, but if either of us gets to date them, it's me," Foggy persisted.

"Okay, Fog," Matt agreed, patting Foggy's shoulder. "Anyway, did Karen say what she found?"

"Not really," Foggy shrugged. "But she said she found a few things she knew you'd wanna hear. I couldn't tell if that was a good thing or a bad thing, honestly."

"Guess we'll find out," Matt sighed. "Hopefully good."

\---

This was not good.

"He's a _war criminal?_ " Matt hissed. "I mean... Alright, now that I think about it, he _did_ mention something about the Cold War ─ but I didn't think he was serious! This guy wasn't older than forty, tops."

Karen shrugged. "Some mutants age way slower than _homo sapiens._ I've heard people say Mystique is over one hundred years old."

Matt frowned, picking at his sandwich. "What did he do?" he asked hesitantly.

"Well, he was a known associate of a mutant supremacist named Sebastian Shaw for a while. Description fits everything you said. Azazel is the only name they were ever able to find that belonged to the guy. Then this Shaw dies in the early sixties, it's not really clear how ─ the records are all blacked out ─ and not too long after that, he was reported as an associate of Magneto's. But he's supposed to have died in the early seventies. That's the only reason any of this stuff is declassified." Matt heard her flip around a sheet of paper to show Foggy, presumably a photo ─ it smelled more heavily of ink, and it sounded like thicker paper.

"Karen, I'm eating," Foggy complained. Then, for Matt's benefit: "It's an autopsy photo, I think. Just his face, though."

"He's pretty good-looking," Karen said, holding back a laugh as she tucked the picture back into her folder. Foggy made a noise of disgust. Matt couldn't help noticing her heartbeat didn't waver when she said it, though.

"So I was working with a militant mutant supremacist," Matt sighed. "I don't think he's going to leave this case alone. What am I going to do?"

"You could call the Avengers or the X-Men," Foggy suggested. "I bet they've run into him before."

"This isn't exactly Avengers territory. If the whole world doesn't need saving, they don't care." Matt couldn't quite keep the bitter, derisive tone out of his voice. "And I have no idea how to contact the X-Men. The only reason they got hold of the trafficking victims was because Azazel knew how."

"So the next time, hang around after he leaves," Karen said, as though it was the obvious solution. Perhaps it was. Matt considered that. "All they're probably going to do is take the case over. The way I see it, you have two choices: work with this guy, or talk to the X-Men and hope they'll let you work with them."

Matt sighed and rubbed at his eyes beneath his glasses for a moment. Suddenly, he wasn't so hungry. "I guess I'll just have to... I don't know. I'll have to see what happens the next time I see him?" He shrugged helplessly. "The guy can teleport. There's not much I can do to stop him."

"You'll figure it out," Karen encouraged earnestly. "You always do."

"Yeah, we'll see about that," Matt muttered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> alaric is one of my favorite ocs, i couldn't help sneaking them in here. there will be more azazel in the next chapter, i promise.


End file.
